The Clones of Mawcett

by DePrima, Thomas

  "Then we'll have to hope that they prefer a lifetime of confinement to a swift and immediate death."

  It was decided that the three battleships would each spearhead a separate search effort for the Raider base. Before Raider-One was found, no one would have thought to look for a pirate base inside a hollowed out asteroid because the effort required to create such a base seemed just too enormous to be seriously contemplated. In hindsight, the solution was the only practicable one. Despite the vastness of space, somebody would have noticed the assembly of a large force of non-SC warships in Galactic Alliance space. Of course, in the past, no one ever imagined that the Raiders had such a large fleet of warships, which is another reason that no one contemplated the construction of such a base.

  The force divided into the three groups and began investigating all asteroids in the sector. It took almost three weeks before the Bellona found an asteroid that provided confusing information. Sitting on the very outside edge of an asteroid belt, the enormous, ugly, black rock appeared to be composed of ferrite ore and carbon, yet the readings from sensors represented just forty percent of the anticipated mass for its size. The Bellona continued on past the asteroid as if nothing was wrong and then contacted the rest of the task force. Within forty-eight hours the entire SC warship force had assembled near the asteroid. Having deployed two communication jamming satellites to block IDS communication signals immediately after transmitting an encrypted signal announcing its find, the Bellona had never moved so far away that her sensors weren't constantly scanning the rock, searching for anything out of the ordinary.

  With Prometheus, Chiron, and Bellona sitting twenty-five thousand kilometers off what they felt had to be the area on the asteroid where the hidden doors would be located, and the other ships encircling the asteroid from a similar distance, Captain Gavin broadcast a message on all RF communication frequencies in the microwave spectrum.

  "Attention, Raider base. This is the captain of the Prometheus and the commander of the task force now surrounding your base. You have five minutes to respond. I urge you to contact us, or you face complete destruction."

  The seconds ticked off slowly as they waited for a response. The captain even allowed a full extra minute before nodding to the weapons fire control officer. A second later a single torpedo was fired at the asteroid. As it reached a point one-hundred kilometers from the asteroid, a dozen phased array lasers suddenly uncovered and opened fire. Either the gunners weren't very skilled, or perhaps the weapons weren't very accurate, because the torpedo nearly reached the asteroid before being destroyed. The laser fire conclusively proved that the task force had found the base.

  At twenty-five thousand kilometers from the asteroid, the GSC ships were outside the effective range of the asteroid's lasers. Although a laser pulse can travel a few hundred thousand kilometers before light-speed lag makes its effectiveness negligible, numerous other factors such as beam distortion from vibration, target motion, and finite sensor resolution are at work. Extreme distances didn't always stop a gunner from trying, but damage at this range is sufficiently rare that experienced gunners usually didn't bother. Unfortunately, the GSC arrays were equally useless against the asteroid. The ships had to either move in closer or rely on torpedoes to press their attack.

  When no word came from the asteroid during the next five minutes, the captain gave the order to fire a volley of five torpedoes. Two were destroyed by fire from the asteroid, but the other three impacted the asteroid's walls. The effect was paltry. It was obvious that torpedoes weren't going to open a hole in the asteroid anytime soon. Gavin called a meeting of his senior officers to discuss the situation. Kanes and his top four people, who had transferred to the Prometheus when the Chiron arrived, also attended. A vid conference link was established with each of the ships in the task force, and the other senior staffs were able to participate. The large monitor in the bridge deck conference room was a patchwork of images being received from conference rooms aboard the other ships.

  "As you all know," Gavin said as the conference began, "we've ascertained that the asteroid does house the Raider base, but our torpedoes have had minimal effect on that hunk of rock. Although deadly against any ship, our torpedoes practically just bounce off that thing. We have to develop a strategy for penetrating a seemingly impenetrable fortress. We're too far away for laser fire to be effective, and if we move closer we'd be putting our own ships in peril from the asteroid's guns, without any expectation of immediate results. I'm open to any suggestions."

  The officers looked at one another, or down at the table as they thought. Their weapons weren't designed to penetrate kilometers of rock. All had expected the Raiders to flee as soon as they found their base under attack.

  "We have a new weapon," Captain Kanes offered, "that might be able to crack that thing like a hard boiled egg, but it will take four months or more to get it here."

  "What is it?" Captain Gavin asked.

  "It's still classified 'most secret' so I'll have to get permission from Supreme HQ before I can more fully explain its explosive capability, or even guarantee that we can use it. But basically, it's an advancement on a weapon developed in the late twentieth century for warfare on Earth. That weapon was called a 'bunker buster' because it would plow through multiple layers of reinforced concrete before exploding, the idea being to penetrate to the lowest levels of subterranean fortifications before detonating. I know that the weapons research people have been looking for a place to properly test it."

  "Based on what we've just seen," Captain Gavin said, "we'll need at least four to guarantee that one makes it through. What would happen if the gunners fail to shoot any of the weapons down?

  "Well–– based on the expected yield reports that I've seen, we might have a situation like that of Raider-One after Commander Carver delivered her little present. There might be very little of that base left if four torpedoes with the new warhead all made it through successfully. We might not even be able to even identify which ships were inside before the attack."

  "It sounds like a weapon of last resort then," Captain Hyden of the Bellona said.

  "Yes, but if the Raiders won't surrender, it may be our last resort. We can't keep sixteen warships here indefinitely, and we can't just turn around and head for the barn now that we've found them."

  "Sirs," Jenetta said, "if the new weapon is as powerful as suggested, we should only fire one at a time..."

  "Don't be ridiculous, Commander," LaSalle said derisively, interrupting Jenetta's proposal. "the Raider gunners would all concentrate their fire on the one torpedo and its chances of getting through would be significantly reduced."

  "I was thinking that we send three or four regular torpedoes along with it, to act as diversions. If the Raiders knock the special one down, then we send five more, again with only one of them containing the new warhead. Our first goal should be to breach the walls, not knock down the castle."

  "That sounds like a sensible idea, Commander," Kanes said.

  "I agree," Gavin said, nodding his head slightly.

  LaSalle scowled, but said nothing. She had spoken up too quickly and Carver had made her look like a fool in front of everyone viewing the teleconference when she expounded her idea.

  "Sirs," Jenetta said, "if this asteroid is like Raider-One, then the weakest point has to be the main doors. Instead of ten or twenty kilometers of rock, we would only be trying to break through a few meters of metal and the composite materials used for camouflage. I have to believe that the torpedoes would have had more of an effect if we had really identified the door area. We must be attacking the wrong point; perhaps one deliberately designed to mislead. I suggest that we fire a number of torpedoes at the asteroid from different points and then use the resulting seismal information to determine where the tunnel doors actually are."

  There was silence in the room for minute. "You think that we've been deceived into attacking a point where we couldn't possibly break through?" Gavin said thoughtfully. "
It's possible. With the doors closed, the asteroid just looks like a big chunk of black rock."

  "Even if we're attacking the wrong point," Captain Powers of the Chiron said, "we still may not be able to crack open a hole in the asteroid once we identify the entrance."

  "Captain Kanes," Captain Gavin said, "find out if we may have the new weapons for 'testing' against that asteroid. That'll give the Raiders four months to surrender, or us four months to find another alternative. Commander LaSalle, coordinate with our other ships to fire a series of torpedoes for the purpose of collecting seismic data that our science officers can use to identify the asteroid's tunnel into the port and its weakest points."

  "Yes sir."

  "Any other ideas?" Gavin scanned the faces around the table and on the monitor, waiting until the silence seemed to become pervasive. "Very well. Dismissed."

  Kanes immediately headed for his assigned quarters to prepare the encrypted request for the ordnance. The cyphered request would be transmitted via regular RF to a communications relay satellite parked just outside the hundred-million kilometer IDS jamming range, and then retransmitted on IDS to Higgins Space Command base.

  Jenetta was in the gym the next day when Kanes arrived for his workout.

  "Good morning, Commander," he said. "Does that punching bag have a name?"

  "Sir?"

  "The way you're hitting that bag, it seems personal."

  Jenetta smiled grimly. "No, no name, sir. I was just thinking back to my time in the Raider-One detention cell and wondering about Christa."

  "Ah, I see. You're worried that she might be in the Raider base that we're confronting?"

  "It's not impossible."

  "No, it isn't. But you can't let it influence your duty as a Space Command officer."

  "It won't, sir, much as I would regret taking any action that might harm her. She knew the risk when she volunteered to pilot that shuttle. It was virtually a suicide mission, but I believed it was necessary if we were to keep the cloning technology out of the hands of the Raiders."

  Kanes nodded. "She certainly acquired your strength and courage."

  "I hope that it won't be her undoing. I've heard about bonds between siblings that are so strong you can sense when they're in danger, but I've tried as hard as I can and I don't get anything. You'd think that I could pick up something if there was any validity to that premise. When we were together we knew exactly what the other was thinking. When we talked, it was like thinking out loud. I've tried to stretch out with my senses here, but I get nothing back."

  "Most of those reports about such contact are at relatively short distances, such as within a building or maybe across town, not across tens of thousands of kilometers."

  "I suppose," Jenetta said. "I hope that whatever else happens, I learn what happened to Christa. If we use the weapons that you've requested, there may not be enough left to determine if she was even in there."

  "I wish that it could be otherwise. Perhaps something will develop that will allow us to avoid using the new weapon."

  "It would be great if we could warn them, in the hope that they would surrender before we have to use it, but that may not be wise. I remember reading about the discussions among decision makers trying to decide whether or not they should warn the Japanese prior to the use of the first atomic weapon on Earth in 1945. Some felt that the Japanese would surrender if they knew what was about to befall them."

  "Yes, but the prevailing sentiment was that by warning them they would simply make more of an effort to shoot down the bomber. Since the United States only had two such weapons readily available, they decided to drop it without warning. In hindsight, a warning wouldn't have done any good. The Japanese refused to surrender even after the first bomb was dropped because their fanatical military leadership didn't believe that the U.S. could have more than one. Only after the second bomb was dropped did they decide that they couldn't continue to wage war against an opponent that possessed such awesome weapons."

  "But there won't be any second chances here, sir. Not if the weapon is as powerful as you say."

  "I only have preliminary testing data to go on, and the test results were from very small devices, but the yield is reportedly twenty times greater than the fusion warheads we've used so far. The potential power estimate was arrived at by extrapolating the yield of the small devices."

  "Then the yield from the larger devices could be much greater, or much less, than predicted?"

  "It's possible, but not too likely. The extrapolation formula was developed by using information accumulated from multiple small test weapons of varying sizes. Because it burrows in first, it becomes hundreds of times more powerful than torpedoes that impact on the surface."

  "If we're successful here, you'd have a procedure in place to use against the other Raider bases."

  "Yes, we'll be using this as sort of a testing ground for the weapon and future such operations. It would be nice if we could recover the space station somewhat intact so we could examine it closely. The same Raider engineers are probably responsible for constructing all of them. You didn't leave us much to go on with Raider-One."

  "I'm sorry now, that the station was totally destroyed, but at the time I wasn't. Following my escape, I expected to be pursued by dozens of fully armed warships, with trained crews, whose only goal was to destroy me. The destruction of the station and the ships was fortunate at the time, to say the least, but if the explosion had only rendered the port's complement of ships unusable, it might have been better."

  "It'd be convenient if we'd been able to plant some conventional explosives here. Not enough to destroy the entire station; just enough to kick a hole in the side of that asteroid." Captain Kanes stretched his arms. "Speaking of kicking, are you up for a little kick boxing practice?"

  * * *

  The next few days passed slowly. The seismic effort using torpedoes provided enough information about the asteroid's structure to enable the engineers to identify the placement of the main doors with reasonable certainty, and the three battleships moved their position to cover the newly identified entrance. Torpedoes fired against the doors didn't have much more effect than the early strikes, but the GSC task force was better positioned if any Raider ships tried to make a break for it.

  On the fifth day of the siege, just as Jenetta's watch was ending, the tac officer suddenly said, "Commander, the DeTect system shows a ship approaching?"

  "Send the course information to the helm. Helm, turn towards the contact and build our envelope. Com, signal GQ."

  "Aye, Commander," the two officers and com Chief said.

  Gavin, who had just arrived to relieve Jenetta, turned towards the tac officer, "Speed and ETA?"

  "Light-187, Sir; twelve minutes."

  "Helm, engage as soon as our envelope is built," Jenetta said. "Light-375."

  "Yes ma'am. Helm will engage at Light-375."

  "Com, notify the other ships to hold position," Gavin said.

  "Aye, Captain," the com Chief said.

  "I'll take it, Jen," Captain Gavin said. "You're relieved."

  "Aye, Captain."

  Four minutes later the Prometheus came to a stop directly in the path of the oncoming ship and waited.

  "The configuration of the approaching ship matches that of a Tsgardi vessel, Captain," the tactical officer said.

  The collision avoidance system of the oncoming ship automatically cut its Light Speed drive and dropped its temporal envelope when it sensed the Prometheus directly in its path.

  "Tactical, jam all IDS communications," Gavin said. "Helm, take us up to her using Sub-Light-5. Tactical, have our laser gunners target their temporal envelope generator and be prepared to fire on my command."

  "Aye, Captain."

  As with the jamming satellites at Mawcett, any attempted transmission of IDS com traffic within a hundred-million kilometer radius would be blocked. You couldn't 'see' the signal canceling effect and only knew that it was there when you flew into the
'dead air' zone and tried to send a message. The Prometheus would stay close enough to make sure that the approaching ship couldn't transmit any messages to other Raider ships.

  Jenetta moved towards the larboard side of the bridge, taking a position where she knew she'd be 'off camera' to the lens on the front view screen. She would be able to obliquely see the bridge view of the approaching ship, but they wouldn't be able to see her if vid communications were established.

  "Com, hail the ship using RF com frequencies in the microwave spectrum. Send this message, 'This is Captain Lawrence Gavin of the GSC Battleship Prometheus, calling the ship off our bow.'"

  They waited about ten seconds and then the com operator said, "Visual image coming from the ship, Captain."

  "Put it on the front monitor."

  An image of the Tsgardi captain that Jenetta had seen while she was on Mawcett, appeared on the front view-screen.

  "This is Captain Atakis Verdisqi of the Boshdyte. Why have you blocked our path and our IDS communications?"

  Captain Gavin immediately recognized the name from the report that Jenetta had filed. "Captain, shut down your engines and prepare to be boarded."

  "We are a merchant ship in open space. By what right do you propose to board my ship?"

  "By the authority vested in me by Galactic Space Command, according to the laws established by the Galactic Alliance. You will be charged with attacking the archeological dig-site at Loudescott on the planet Mawcett and remanded to a Space Command justice court location for trial."

  "That's ridiculous. We haven't been anywhere near Mawcett."

  "You'll have the right to defense council if you surrender peacefully. Otherwise, we'll terminate your career right here and now. Your choice, Captain."

  "You have no right to stop honest merchants in the pursuit of trade," Verdisqi said angrily.

  "Your ship is carrying too much firepower to simply be a merchant vessel," Captain Gavin commented.

  "These are dangerous times. We have the right to defend ourselves."